CHAPTER IX : THE SEPARATION OF THE SPOUSES

ARTICLE 1: THE DISSOLUTION OF THE BOND

§2 The unbaptised party is considered to depart if he or she is unwilling to live with the baptised party, or to live peacefully without offence to the Creator, unless the baptised party has, after the reception of baptism, given the other just cause to depart.

1° he or she also wishes to receive baptism;

2° he or she at least is willing to live peacefully with the baptised party without offence to the Creator.

§2 This interpellation is to be done after baptism. However, the local Ordinary can for a grave reason permit that the interpellation be done before baptism; indeed he can dispense from it, either before or after baptism, provided it is established, by at least a summary and extrajudicial procedure, that it cannot be made or that it would be useless.

§2 Even an interpellation made privately by the converted party is valid, and indeed it is lawful if the form prescribed above cannot be observed.

§3 In both cases there must be lawful proof in the external forum of the interpellation having been done and of its outcome.

1° if the other party has replied in the negative to the interpellation, or if the interpellation has been lawfully omitted;

2° if the unbaptised person, whether already interpellated or not, who at first persevered in peaceful cohabitation without offence to the Creator, has subsequently departed without just cause, without prejudice to the provisions of cann. 1144 and 1145.

§2 In the cases mentioned in §1, when baptism has been received, the marriage is to be contracted in the legal form, with due observance, if need be, of the provisions concerning mixed marriages and of other provisions of law.

§3 In the light of the moral, social and economic circumstances of place and person, the local Ordinary is to ensure that adequate provision is made, in accordance with the norms of justice, christian charity and natural equity, for the needs of the first wife and of the others who have been dismissed.